Liverpool FC Forum

by **Scottbot** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 5:54 pm

heimdall wrote:
Benny The Noon wrote:Im sorry but did i question how good a fan he is ?

Im just wondering why all these people that keep posting Get Rafa out werent around when we were doing well and giving him praise and suddenly creep out of the woodwork when we have a poor spell .

Well maybe they only feel the need to post when they are p1ssed off and disappointed with the team. I don't get your point, are you saying that they shouldn't be allowed to post unless they join the mutual w@nkfest every time we beat some newly promoted side or something?

Maybe everyone could try posting in the positives/negaitives thread and at least we might get a bit of balance compared to the usual biased repetitive BS and name-calling that gets posted in this (and every other) 'wankfest of a thread'.

by **Ben Patrick** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 5:56 pm

Scottbot wrote:
heimdall wrote:
Benny The Noon wrote:Im sorry but did i question how good a fan he is ?

Im just wondering why all these people that keep posting Get Rafa out werent around when we were doing well and giving him praise and suddenly creep out of the woodwork when we have a poor spell .

Well maybe they only feel the need to post when they are p1ssed off and disappointed with the team. I don't get your point, are you saying that they shouldn't be allowed to post unless they join the mutual w@nkfest every time we beat some newly promoted side or something?

Maybe everyone could try posting in the positives/negaitives thread and at least we might get a bit of balance compared to the usual biased repetitive BS and name-calling that gets posted in this (and every other) 'wankfest of a thread'.

Haaa, just cos ye thread's died on its erse Scott

by **Benny The Noon** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 6:03 pm

Have done scott - apologies didnt see the thread .

by **Scottbot** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 6:11 pm

Ben Patrick wrote:
Scottbot wrote:
heimdall wrote:
Benny The Noon wrote:Im sorry but did i question how good a fan he is ?

Im just wondering why all these people that keep posting Get Rafa out werent around when we were doing well and giving him praise and suddenly creep out of the woodwork when we have a poor spell .

Well maybe they only feel the need to post when they are p1ssed off and disappointed with the team. I don't get your point, are you saying that they shouldn't be allowed to post unless they join the mutual w@nkfest every time we beat some newly promoted side or something?

Maybe everyone could try posting in the positives/negaitives thread and at least we might get a bit of balance compared to the usual biased repetitive BS and name-calling that gets posted in this (and every other) 'wankfest of a thread'.

Haaa, just cos ye thread's died on its erse Scott

Yeah I know! You know how long that thread-starter took!!!!

by **heimdall** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 6:15 pm

Scottbot wrote:
Ben Patrick wrote:
Scottbot wrote:
heimdall wrote:
Benny The Noon wrote:Im sorry but did i question how good a fan he is ?

Im just wondering why all these people that keep posting Get Rafa out werent around when we were doing well and giving him praise and suddenly creep out of the woodwork when we have a poor spell .

Well maybe they only feel the need to post when they are p1ssed off and disappointed with the team. I don't get your point, are you saying that they shouldn't be allowed to post unless they join the mutual w@nkfest every time we beat some newly promoted side or something?

Maybe everyone could try posting in the positives/negaitives thread and at least we might get a bit of balance compared to the usual biased repetitive BS and name-calling that gets posted in this (and every other) 'wankfest of a thread'.

Haaa, just cos ye thread's died on its erse Scott

Yeah I know! You know how long that thread-starter took!!!!

I actually tried posting there but gave up after 10 minutes trying to come up with a positive about Rafa, by that time I had a list of about 20 negatives.

by **Benny The Noon** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 7:54 pm

Another Tomkins piece

I don't want to sound like I'm just making excuses, but I'm finding it almost impossible to judge the performances this season.

What should we expect of the team when constantly missing players, with numerous enforced changes each and every week?

Maybe I should expect more. Or maybe others expect too much.

I'd know where I stand with the best XI, or even something approaching it, playing most weeks. But this has been a season of utter chaos, in terms of selection.

The biggest hypocrisy with a lot of Benítez's critics is this: slating him for rotating, saying that you can't win trophies making lots of changes (even though other major managers have had success when making a greater number), yet failing to cut him slack when he's forced to make far too many due to injuries.

And injuries are far more unsettling than rotation. At least with rotation the manager has full control of his selection. And at least with rotation the unused players are still fit, and usually on the bench (an example: Ferguson often brought on Rooney and Ronaldo to try and win the game if he rotated his side).

Players like Torres, Gerrard and Johnson are currently in and out of the side, and these are all match-winners. So is Benayoun. Aquilani, another potential match-winner, is getting closer to playing, and may well start in Hungary, but his selection is not straightforward, after a longer-than-anticipated ankle problem.

It didn't help against City that Gerrard visibly tired in the second half, after a very influential first 45. Maybe he was just frozen out of the game as City threw caution to the wind to equalise, but he's missed a lot of training lately. At least the 90 minutes will help him rediscover his sharpness, even if the second 45 more-or-less passed him by.

There has to come a ‘critical mass'-type point with injuries, beyond which too much is missing to expect to compete at anything approaching your normal level. Can you cope without two players?

Three players? Four? Five? Six? ... Twelve? ... Twenty-five?!

Where is the cut-off point?

The same applies to players looking to get fit with games; hence why starting both Gerrard and Aquilani may have presented a gamble too far. Carry too many under-par players in terms of fitness, and you'll suffer, especially in the tougher fixtures.

We can all play this new game called Fantasy Physio, but how many fans have both the necessary medical insight and the all-important access to the players and their medical notes? None that I'm aware of.

Aquilani needs match fitness, and can't get that without playing. However, if he's thrown in and the Reds lose, at a high-pressure time like this, that's not helpful either. Particularly when Gerrard isn't 100% sharp.

If anyone think it's a simple decision, they're deluded. It was seriously complicated by the two early injuries, and the fact that much more than 60 minutes for Benayoun would be a massive risk.

I admit that I was surprised when Aurelio came on, but from that point the Reds had full control of the game, and had chances to win it. By helping strengthen the left-hand side, the Reds got the upper hand.

While neither team came into the game high on confidence, the 13 players City used cost £162m; the 14 Liverpool used cost £71m. That's well below half of the visitor's line up.

A large part of this is down to the incredible spending at Eastlands. But also, three of Benítez's four biggest signings were either unavailable or only on the cusp of the required fitness.

But I still feel that the Reds have sufficient quality and experience to finish above City, assuming the number of fit players increases. Are Liverpool's reserves better than City's first-team players? Of course not.

I'd take Liverpool's strongest XI over City's any day of the week, but they clearly have more depth (particularly up front – Tevez, Robinho and Santa Cruz in reserve!), and in the 2-2 draw, Hughes had a full hand to choose from. Benítez didn't.

Liverpool started perfectly, with a very positive first five mintues that almost brought a goal, but the momentum was killed by two early injuries, particularly the one to Agger. The game slowed down, the Kop lost its buzz (which is never as buzzy as in later kick-offs).
City's job was to break up the game and quieten the crowd; the injuries did that for them.

I have to say that I thought De Jong's tackle on Babel was terrible: off the ground, two-footed, studs showing. I think he tried to play the ball, and may well have won it – I'm not saying it was malicious – but it is without doubt a red card in the modern rules.

Given that Degen was sent off for a far less dangerous challenge at Fulham, this could only have been a red.

But that's the kind of luck Liverpool are having this season. Even the N'Gog penalty against Birmingham was wrongly analysed as fortunate, with Carsley's desperate lunge missing the ball; contact with the player isn't necessary if you cut right across his path and don't actually get the ball. If N'Gog stayed on his feet, he might have a broken ankle now.

(And yes, I'd say the same if it was at the other end. If you dive in and don't win the ball, you only have yourself to blame.)

I also thought Kuyt was bundled over by Bellamy in the box – a blatant penalty – and that their 2nd goal looked offside, although that was a close call.

But I don't think you can argue with a draw being the fair result. The Reds looked nervy after taking the lead; as if they didn't know whether to twist or stick.

From Liverpool's point of view, it was a fairly good first half display, a very good start to the second half, a poor 25 minutes after taking the lead (either sitting back or being forced back), and a storming ending that deserved a winner.

I'm not saying that the season's problems are all down to bad luck and injuries, but it becomes much more of a lottery if you have a depleted squad.

Part of the problem Liverpool had against City was that without Johnson, who reported unfit to play the morning of the game, and with Kyrgiakos (who I felt did well) having to replace Agger after just five minutes, the Reds were shorn of a lot of defensive pace, against possibly the quickest front line around: Bellamy, Adebayor and Wright-Phillips, who were later supplemented by Tevez; and with Ireland arriving from deep.

As a result, it was hard to push up as a back-line. It must also be harder defending as a unit when you've never played together before; the last couple of weeks have seen some previously untried and untested combinations, as has the season as a whole.

I've said it a lot recently, but the constant changes to the back four have been a nightmare. I'm sorry, but any manager would struggle to get sufficient results in the circumstances.

Every week the defence has had to change, and often during the match, too. It's been injury after injury.

I'd be a lot more worried if it was the four/five regulars who were starting every week, and still conceding a higher than usual number of goals. It'll be harder to win games on a regular basis again until there's a bit more stability there. When a team is not keeping clean sheets, defenders get nervy; when they are keeping clean sheets, they can look unbeatable.

Liverpool defended poorly for City's opening goal, but then the visitor's were twice “beaten” by set-pieces; Lucas knows he should have headed that late chance in and become the hero, following on from Skrtel's strike.

All around the country, goals are flying in from corners and free-kicks. So Liverpool aren't alone in struggling with them; but clearly also need to cut out the mistakes, too.

On the plus side, in adversity, some young players continue to shine.
A big positive is the hold-up and link play of N'Gog, who yet again had a hand in the goals: first by winning the free-kick, and then with some brilliant skill to work an opening, before his shot deflected to Benayoun to equalise.

He's showing a great appreciation of what's going on around him, and is progressing very nicely indeed. However, he's still getting used to the gruelling demands of 90 minutes of Premiership action, and seems to be tiring after the hour mark. It's all part of his development.

Lucas also continues to get better and better; evidence of what you can get from players by not dropping them. (I'm not saying that dropping players is wrong, just that there are alternative approaches, too.) I believe that Lucas will score more goals in time, but it's the one part of his game where a lack of confidence still shows.

I think the Brazilian's form has improved massively these past six weeks, as has Mascherano's. The Argentine was sensational against City – he was everywhere, passing with vision and dribbling forward
like a man possessed. At the start of the season they looked a little unbalanced as a duo, but when they are passing well, they are far from the negative pairing some people paint them as.

So all in all, I still sense that this is a team very much on the right lines, but a little derailed of late. You can argue over fine details, but there's not a lot wrong with the side, and the majority of the squad, when fit and in form.

But confidence and fitness are two of the most important factors in the sport, yet the hardest for the manager to control.

Injuries can happen no matter how careful or well prepared you are – anyone can have a muscle injury (name a player who hasn't?), and anyone can clash heads or get studs in their ankle; while confidence comes and goes in mysterious ways, which often revolve around turning points (good and bad) for both individuals and the collective.

You can boost a player all you want, but what happens on the other side of that white line affects his performance; start with a bad touch, and it can go downhill fast. End a barren spell with a lucky goal, and you can get a hat-trick.

A lucky deflection can change a team's season, not just the player who claims the goal off his backside.

Another big week awaits, and I'd gladly see a few deflected Liverpool winners in the coming fixtures.

by **bigmick** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 8:05 pm

Benny The Noon wrote:Another Tomkins piece

I don't want to sound like I'm just making excuses, but ......

who could ever think such a thing.

by **Benny The Noon** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 8:13 pm

Tomkins is a rather red tinted spec fellow but it is good to see positive things in the press even if it is a bit over the top .

by **bigmick** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 8:21 pm

Benny The Noon wrote:Tomkins is a rather red tinted spec fellow but it is good to see positive things in the press even if it is a bit over the top .

"A bit over the top" :laugh:

'"Lucas is getting better and better all the time" (he is talking primarily about the Man City game here) and "he will score more goals in time" :laugh:

He's only ever scored one hasn't he FFS so you'd certainly fecking hope so :laugh:

.

by **Benny The Noon** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 8:36 pm

bigmick wrote:
Benny The Noon wrote:Tomkins is a rather red tinted spec fellow but it is good to see positive things in the press even if it is a bit over the top .

"A bit over the top"

'"Lucas is getting better and better all the time" (he is talking primarily about the Man City game here) and "he will score more goals in time" He's only ever scored one hasn't he FFS so you'd certainly fecking hope so .

I was being kind - the City game was a poor one from Lucas - game just passed him by totally but before he had been improving a fair bit .

by **NANNY RED** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 9:52 pm

s@int wrote:Rafa 'manipulates' the fans - Redknapp

Updated: November 23, 2009, 8:27 AM EST
Former Liverpool star Jamie Redknapp has questioned Rafael Benitez's management and claims that he manipulates the club's fans.

On the eve of Liverpool's crunch Champions League showdown in Hungary against Debrecen - where they could fail to reach the last 16 for the first time under Benitez - Redknapp offered a wide-ranging criticism of the Anfield boss.

Redknapp believes Benitez should abandon the controversial zonal marking system and questioned whether Fernando Torres will want to stay if Liverpool are only in the Europa League next season.

Redknapp, who played more than 300 games for the club between 1991 and 2002, said: "They have won one in 10 now and fans will be thinking. They are firmly behind him, though, he manipulates the fans ,he gets them how he wants them.

"But there comes a time, if they go out of Europe this week and then lose at Everton, that the fans are swayed and will say that we have to look at him now.

"That team is not really going anywhere. The problem you will get is that will Fernando Torres want to play in the Europa League? I don't think so.

LINK TO FULL ARTICLE

Good comeback by Tompkins here

:laugh:

Jamie Redknapp – An Unfunny Joke

Posted on November 23rd, 2009

Written by Paul Tomkins

Stan Collymore and Jamie Redknapp – two Reds I used to stick up for in the ‘90s, but who are now beyond a joke. To be honest, the cream suits debacle deserves to be their legacy. They failed to deliver enough on the pitch, now they put the boot in, week after week.

Time and again, I’d offer a defence on the finer side of Rednapp’s game, in the face of abuse that he was a bottler, a pretty boy, a party animal. More fool me, huh? It hurts to be wrong, but clearly I wasted my time with ingrates who it seems are only in the game for the money. Spice Boy? Alas, it seems so. Classless to the last.

Indeed, Redknapp even tells a funny story himself: Rafa manipulates the media. That’s right. “He manipulates the fans, he gets them how he wants them,” said the sport’s biggest Himbo.

Of course, of course! Rafa Benítez’s son, Jamie Benítez, works as a talking (vacant) head for the most powerful football news media in the country, and writes big-mouth stories in various newspapers.

Benítez is beyond criticism, because his son, Jamie, won’t dare question him, despite working in what is supposed to be a 100% unbiased news organisation. Instead, Jamie Benítez is always taking potshots at that foreign bloke, Harry Redknapp.

Oh, wait – maybe I got the names mixed up a bit there.

Yes, Benítez manipulates the press. That’s why he has given so many press interviews over the years. Oh, hang on, it’s actually just one in five years (the excellent discussion with Tony Evans of the Times), plus the meeting I was granted, based on the fact that I actually bother to do research when analysing the team.

But of course, Benítez has so many allies in Fleet Street and Sky Towers. There’s Tony Evans, Tony Barrett, Brian Reade and… hmm, scratching my head after that. You can add Guillem Balague, too, although he’s hardly a mainstream journo in England, beyond Spanish football.

It must be all the ex-Reds, then. Like Ronnie Whelan, an utter fool of a man – great player, utter plank in terms of acumen – who went on national Irish TV and said that the Liverpool team that faced Debrecen cost £250m. It cost a little over a quarter of that amount.

But hey, that media, eh? Rafa really has them in the palm of his hand, manipulating them. I mean, how dare people like myself point out that being wrong by almost 75% is unacceptable when judging a manager? Should I tell people that Ronnie Whelan only played 100 times for the Reds? Can I be that factually incorrect, to dismiss the man’s record, and demean him? 100 games would put him on a par with Dominic Matteo. Hardly fair of me, eh?

Or Graeme Souness? – a man who constantly criticises Benítez, despite having a far worse record as Liverpool manager. Souness – a man whose spending at Liverpool was on a par with Mourinho’s at Chelsea, in relative terms; a man who, in blowing most of the club’s riches (before the money ran dry) took the club from 1st down to 8th, and left an utter bag of boll.ocks for Roy Evans, beyond the home-grown lads and Rob Jones.

Yes, these are Rafa’s friends in the media. Must be comforting for him, no?

Of course, Redknapp senior would never befriend journos in London drinking holes. He’d never manipulate anything; mud won’t stick to him. He has no connections, does he? He’d never use the media to help him in any way, shape or form. Indeed, he is a actually hermit, living in a cave and spending time in a monestery under a vow of silence. Of course, he doesn’t talk to the BBC, and he must have his reasons.

Jamie kindly tells us that the problems behind the scenes (with the owners) are partly to blame, but not wholly to blame. Of course, he doesn’t mention the Reds’ catastrophic injury crisis, that has decimated the side this season. Yet his dad can talk about his injury crisis, when he needs to.

What boils my blood is this, from last year:

“Every manager says their squad is stretched but if I hadn’t brought the five back that were cast aside when I came here, we’d be desperate,” said the Spurs boss. “We need some cover when we have injuries. You need a squad. Those five aren’t in the UEFA Cup squad so I’ve got kids out of the youth team because you have to have so many homegrown players in your squad.”

Or this, from 2002, when Portsmouth were struggling in the Championship:

“All the injuries we have are long-term. We are not going to kid ourselves, we are not going to run all over teams, we clawed a result today but at the start of the year no one knew who would finish higher, Portsmouth or Millwall, and they still don’t. There is a long way to go. I’m going to have to try to get some loans in now because I’m missing eight players.”

I don’t see Harry Redknapp having to defend his team in tough times from the attacks of his son. “Excuses, Harry!” says Redknapp Jnr? Of course not. “Excuses, Harry!” say ‘me old mucka’ London hacks? Of course not.

Can Harry mention such things without it being a case of manipulating the media? Surely a manager has a right to point out when loads of players are missing, and it be considered factual? In my book, he can. Why can’t Benítez?

I have no problem with Spurs. I have no problem with Harry Redknapp, beyond his constant exemption from criticism from one of the game’s most visible pundits. He’s a really good manager, if a little old fashioned for my tastes. And, lest we forget, totally and utterly unproven at a club expected to win trophies. He’s on a high right now, so fair play to him, but it’s only November. And he’s also got far better backing from the board, in terms of money pumped into the squad; it costs £50m more than Liverpool’s. But he’s still a good manager, who deserved some slack being cut in times when he was struggling, such as the season in which his team was relegated.

So it’s not a case of me attacking Harry, just asking why his son has to spend so much time and energy attacking Benítez, who has a far better record in every which way than Souness, Evans and Houllier, the three Liverpool managers he played under. (And I guess Jamie wouldn’t have liked any of them being constantly slated by someone like himself.)

As a Liverpool fan, on Liverpool sites, I defend the record of the Liverpool manager, because, given the club’s lack of financial clout, is more than sound. It is based on years and years of detailed research, to enable me to make fair comparisons. It is based on the realities of context, not some spurious whim of a hack. It is based on years of results, not a couple of bad months.

I don’t spend my time criticising Benítez, but then again, I don’t go into the ‘neutral’ national media to attack other managers. So therefore I feel I’m not a hypocrite.

However, I hate how Jamie criticises Rafa for his treatment of Robbie Keane, yet his own dad called Darren Bent – now a success at Sunderland – a worse finisher than Jamie’s mother. Wow, that’s great man-management, eh?

Maybe Spurs would have been better off getting the best out of Bent, rather than buying Crouch? – just using the kind of nonsense people throw at Benítez.

Again, slating Bent so publicly is Harry’s right, but for fu.ck’s sake, stop being such an absolute hypocrite, Jamie, about nasty mean Rafa and cuddly old daddy.

‘You can’t bench players like Robbie Keane’ – ‘you can’t do that £20m players’, said Jamie last season. Yet Harry has done so this season.

‘You can’t play Keane on the left-wing’. Yet Harry has. And so on. Harry has a right to play his players when and where he wants. So does Benítez.

This Liverpool team “is not really going anywhere,” Jamie tells us. Well, it’s a team that went very far last season. But if there’s a crisis at Liverpool, it’s been largely injury driven. It’s not a Liverpool team; it a mish-mash of whoever’s fit at the time.

But I love this pearl of wisdom: “The problem you will get is that will Fernando Torres want to play in the Europa League? I don’t think so.”

Well, do Robbie Keane, Peter Crouch and Jermaine Defoe?

Of course, they’re not actually in Europe at all.

(Excuse my language, but can I be an utter c.unt, and come back if Spurs fail to qualify for the Champions League, and suggest all the players who might be unhappy at another year in the European wilderness? Can I start making a living putting the boot in to good managers who deserve better?)

For crying out loud, Torres was signed by Benítez, and has an outstanding goal record only since playing for Benítez.

Stop telling us what Torres will do when you don’t know him, or what draws him to Liverpool. He has the utmost respect for Benítez, and unlike a lot of the stuff you come out with, that really is a fact.

Non-football note: I will admit that Redknapp, as neither bald nor big-nosed, has probably never had to endure dates like this.

by **heimdall** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 10:13 pm

Tomkins is actually getting a bit silly now, if he thinks that Collymore and Redknapp didn't contribute to the team and yet praises Lucas so highly, that's enough evidence for me that the man's a buffoon and most probably in the pay of Rafa.

by **NANNY RED** » Mon Nov 23, 2009 10:30 pm

heimdall wrote:Tomkins is actually getting a bit silly now, if he thinks that Collymore and Redknapp didn't contribute to the team and yet praises Lucas so highly, that's enough evidence for me that the man's a buffoon and most probably in the pay of Rafa.

Do you know what Heimdell you do my fecking head in , you havnt got one good word to say about hardly any of our players never mind the manager, Please tell me what the feck are you doing supporting us , id really love to know like, You get on the tail end of everything thats negative, An no im not havin a pop here just asking a question,

by **Aussie Style** » Tue Nov 24, 2009 5:20 pm

heimdall wrote:Tomkins is actually getting a bit silly now, if he thinks that Collymore and Redknapp didn't contribute to the team and yet praises Lucas so highly, that's enough evidence for me that the man's a buffoon and most probably in the pay of Rafa.

You are an absolute c.unt of a bloke heimdall. Guaranteed sh.it talking with every post.

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